The article raises the question of the contemporary Gaudiya-vaishnava adherent’s attitude towards the war and kshatriya duty. It analyses the ways Vaishnavas from Ukraine, Russia and India perceive Russia’s war against Ukraine and kshatriya duty in the context of understanding the holy war in the Mahabharata and Krishna’s instructions about duty of kshatriya in Bhagavad-gita. There are four types of symbolic correlation of modern war with the events of the Mahabharata: religious, mythological, ideological, and ethical. The differences between them (...) have led to disagreements and discussions within the Vaishnava community about how to understand the duty of the Vaishnava in this war. The article substantiates the religious nature of the spiritual-practical position of Ukrainian Vaishnavas, which for some of them is expressed in peaceful service to people during the war, and for others - in the performance of the duty of kshatriya in the ranks of the armed forces. (shrink)

Background: There is a great deal of overlap between the symptoms of schizophrenia and the nature of yogic experiences described in various societies and religions. Aim: This study aims to separate the symptoms of psychotic disorders from the experiences described by various yogic systems. Materials and Methods: A review of various scriptures like Shrimad Bhagvad Gita, Vedas, and other spiritual literature was done and was compared with the various scientific studies regarding yogic experiences. Results: The result shows that, (...) there exist the abnormal behaviors, which need to be controlled by taking help from psychiatry, but there are also the genuine yogic experiences, that are often confused with the symptoms of a psychotic disorder like schizophrenia. Conclusions: The science of psychiatry is playing an important role in classifying the behavioral patterns and thus helping us to control the abnormal behavior patterns. Still, we cannot deny the fact that, the budding science in a developmental stage is unable to unravel the complete mysteries of human mind and because of that; some genuine yogic experiences are often confused with psychotic disorders. (shrink)

La cobertura universal de salud está en el centro de la acción actual para fortalecer los sistemas de salud y mejorar el nivel y la distribución de la salud y los servicios de salud. Este documento es el informe fi nal del Grupo Consultivo de la OMS sobre la Equidad y Cobertura Universal de Salud. Aquí se abordan los temas clave de la justicia (fairness) y la equidad que surgen en el camino hacia la cobertura universal de salud. Por lo (...) tanto, el informe es pertinente para cada agente que infl uye en ese camino y en particular para los gobiernos, ya que se encargan de supervisar y guiar el progreso hacia la cobertura universal de salud. (shrink)

This report from the WHO Consultative Group on Equity and Universal Health Coverage offers advice on how to make progress fairly towards universal health coverage.

In the previous module we examined the dialectic that Krishna initiates in the Bhagavad Gītā. Arjuna’s despondency and worry about the war he must fight is captured in his own words by teleological concerns – consequentialism and virtue theoretic considerations. In the face of a challenge, a teleological approach results in the paradox of teleology---namely, the more we are motivated by exceptional and unusual ends, the less likely we are to pursue our ends given a low expected utility. Krishna's solution (...) is to switch to a procedural ethics. To this extent, Krishna identifies three ethical theories. Two were discussed extensively in the earlier chapter on the Gītā. The first is basic deontology, called karma yoga. This states that we should choose to do our duty without appealing to the outcome as a justification. The duties in question are definable by good outcomes, but the outcomes do not constitute the reason for embracing duty. The second, spoken about at length, is bhakti yoga. According to this, the right thing to do is to worship the ideal by our actions. This practice results in us improving our skill and practice such that we come to liberate ourselves from fault and instantiate the ideal itself. The third is the Gītā’s metaethical theory—conceptual account of the right and the good. This is called “jñāna yoga.” This module focuses on the metaethical dimensions of the Gītā. (shrink)

This is the first of lessons on the Bhagavad Gītā. The Bhagavad Gītā is a small section of the Mahābhārata, which is a dialectical experiment in moral theory. Here the characters not only assume the role of prominent ethical theories, but must also work through the ethical challenge as a matter of practice. In this module I explicate the main arguments of the Gītā, which lead us from teleological accounts of ethics (Virtue Ethics, Consequentialism) to procedural accounts (Deontology and Bhakti). (...) Bhakti is the most radically procedural of the four theories, and provides an account of right action independent of the good. To access article: (a) choose "Ethics 1" from the first drop down menu, and (b) the title of the paper in the second drop down menu---after clicking on the link (the title of this article above, or the link below). (shrink)

A review of the translation of Uttara Gita by Minati Kar published by the Ramakrishna Mission Institute of Culture, Kolkata, India. Though brief, the Uttara-gita clearly explains the nature of the Atman and the method to realize it,primarily through yoga. This book serves as a supplementary text to the Bhagavadgita. It is a text that inspires aspirants to intensify their spiritual practices. A Sanskrit commentary on the main text ascribed to Gaudapadacharya has also been provided. A glossary of (...) Sanskrit terms would come in handy for those unacquainted with Indian philosophy as would the details of the seven yogic chakras taken from Tantric texts. This slim volume should be a welcome reading for all students of Indian philosophy and should act as a guide for spiritual aspirants. (shrink)

In The Idea of Justice, Amartya Sen, among other things, discusses certain qualities any adequate theory of justice ought to incorporate. Two important qualities a theory of justice should account for are impartiality/objectivity and sensitivity to consequences. In order to motivate his discussion of sensitivity to consequences, Sen discusses the debate between Krishna and Arjuna from the religio-philosophical Hindu text the Bhagavad Gita. According to Sen, Arjuna represents a sensitivity to consequences while Krishna is an archetypal deontologist. In this (...) paper it will be argued that Sen's interpretation of the Gita is inaccurate. Further, a more adequate interpretation will be presented. What will be of significance is that the more adequate interpretation actually demonstrates the importance of an impartial spectator in moral reasoning. Finally, there will be a discussion of some lessons that can be taken from the Gita regarding justice generally. (shrink)

This is an essay I entered in a competition about the Bhagavad Gita. Probably written about 2,000 years ago; this writing is perhaps the greatest philosophical expression of Hinduism. I was attracted to the contest because the website included a very favourable comment about the Bhagavad Gita by Albert Einstein (see below). For a while, I actually considered it possible that I’d win the contest. But that time has passed. The winner has been announced and I can now (...) see my entry for what it is – a naïve attempt to preach science to the religionists, as well as a naïve attempt to preach religion to the scientists. -/- There’s a statement in the essay which I’m wondering about. I said, “However, the concept of possessing a soul is not automatically supported. The idea of having a reincarnating soul would be an easy way of explaining immortality thousands of years ago when people were completely unfamiliar with the scientific facts of an eternal universe, Einstein’s Unified Field, and fractal geometry.” I still think this might be correct. But “might” is the word. I’m wondering about something I later wrote – could the ghostly immaterial body described below be what we call the soul? If such a body is developed in the future to overcome present limitations, could it be referred to as a soul if it travels into the past and is absorbed into a physical body? (It might be what the Bhagavad Gita refers to as the Supersoul, and might be quantum entangled with all space and all time. And if the physical brain is receptive to this so-called entangled soul’s knowledge of everything in space and time, the presently accepted limits to acquiring knowledge would, to use the below quote of Einstein’s, be “superfluous”). The preceding agrees with Zen Buddhism's idea of intuitively getting in touch with your inner self. -/- From “Physics and Philosophy Beyond the Standard Model” (http://vixra.org/abs/1411.0585) – “In 1925, the Austrian physicist Wolfgang Pauli discovered the exclusion principle. This says two similar particles cannot have both the same position and velocity. If two electrons could have identical positions and velocities, they could all collapse into a roughly uniform, dense “soup”. Protons and neutrons would do the same, and there would be no well-defined atoms. So we need the exclusion principle. Force-carrying particles like photons and gravitons do not obey the exclusion principle so we might assume the immaterial body wouldn’t be well-defined and would collapse into a ghostly soup. But perhaps a well-defined structure can be built if the photons are first stopped. The potential for photons to possess mass by having their digital sequence altered and being converted to other particles – or the potential for programming the photons - may make this definition possible. A chrononaut whose body is defined by mass would still have a gravitational effect, and be dark matter. But if she or he would rather not be a lump of dark matter, her or his body might be defined by programming photons and gravitons; creating a body of “light matter”. The beginnings of this technology may be in [43] which speaks of one photon being “stuck” to another.” . (shrink)

O objetivo deste artigo é analisar o conceito de yoga da Bhagavad-gītā. Cinco concepções de yoga encontradas no texto são descritas: yoga enquanto disciplina ou prática, yoga enquanto disciplina qualificada, yoga enquanto estado mental de equanimidade e renúncia, yoga enquanto estado de união e yoga enquanto poder místico. As relações existentes entre essas concepções são explicitadas e o que podemos chamar de a estrutura do yoga na Bhagavad-gītā é pormenorizada.

The author tries to interpret their commentaries on the Gita to ‘develop two competing visions of the relationship between metaphysics and theology, and therefore of how one may relate inquiry to faith’ (xx). In this task, the author has been remarkably successful and he also gives us a wonderful comparative study of Shankara and Ramanuja. Anyone interested in these two thinkers should definitely read this volume.

In the contemporary era, we identify ourselves based on what we consume or what we possess. Besides, various advertisements, celebrities, and other influential personalities encourage and make us believe that we can make a new identity by consuming a specific brand, or relating to a particular institution or connecting with an extraordinary group, etc. Hence, we tend to identify ourselves with consumer goods. In such conditions, Srimad Bhagwat Gita becomes significantly relevant to look for alternative way of life. This (...) paper attempts to explore the concept of Self in Gita as a model for realizing environmental consciousness. Largely, it will analyse the concepts of Nishkama Karma (Detached Action) and the Self to see what it may contribute in developing an apt environmental consciousness. With the analysis of these concepts the paper tries to probe for an epistemological and metaphysical alternative to the Ecology understanding. (shrink)

The Bhagavad Gītā has inspired more interpretive controversy than any other religious scripture in India’s history. The Gītā, a philosophical and spiritual poem of approximately seven hundred verses, is part of the ancient Sanskrit epic, the Mahābhārata. In the Gītā, the Lord Kṛṣṇa, who appears in the form of a charioteer, imparts spiritual teachings to the warrior Arjuna and convinces him to fight in a just war that entails the slaughter of many of Arjuna’s own relatives and loved ones. Śaṅkara, (...) the great eighth-century champion of the Advaita school of philosophy, wrote the first extant commentary on the Gītā. In this commentary, Śaṅkara interpreted the Gītā strictly in accordance with Advaita.. (shrink)

The paper argues that there is a unique from of free will in the Gita based on the universal presence of the ultimate reality.

Morality is traditionally understood as comprised of two components: justice and mercy. The first component, justice, the universal component of the form, is frequently seen as foundational for any moral system – which poses a challenge of explaining the second component, mercy, the particular component of content. Kantian ethics provides an example of this approach. After formulating his universalist theory of ethics in the Groundwork of the metaphysics of morals and further developing it in the Critique of practical reason, he (...) attempts to use it in order to establish the morality of mercy in the Metaphysics of morals. Yet can universal morality of justice necessitate particular ethics of mercy? Using the example of competitive games, the relations between the ethics of justice and that of mercy are demonstrated, and it is shown that the former does not lead to the latter. Moreover, the universality of the rules of moral behavior can serve as a form for blatant brutality. Analyzing the characteristics of particular morality, we can conclude that physical humanity of the moral object, perceived as such by the subject, is a required condition for mercy. Removal of object's humanity is a necessary step toward an ethical system that allows cruelty – a system that can still be based on universal moral rules. Bhagavad Gītā, on the other hand, can be seen as an example of combining nīṣkāmakarma, the formal, universal ethics of desireless action, with a variety of particular motivations originating in the nature and social context of the moral agent. (shrink)

Panentheism has seen a revival over the past two decades in the philosophical literature. This has partially triggered an interest in Indian models of God, which have traditionally been seen as panentheistic. On the other hand, panentheism has been often associated with panpsychism, an old ontological view that sees consciousness as fundamental and ubiquitous in the natural world and which has also enjoyed a renaissance in recent decades. Depending on where one places fundamentality (whether on the microlevel or on the (...) cosmic-level) there will be two types of panpsychism: micropsychism and cosmopsychism. Despite the apparently rich connection between Indian traditions and panpsychism, especially in its cosmopsychist version, recent work within cross-cultural analytic philosophy of mind seems to be mostly focused on atheistic traditions, such as Advaita Vedānta and Buddhism. My goal in this paper is to contribute to the cross-cultural debate over panentheism and Indian models of God, as well as to the debate on the connections between panpsychism, cosmopsychism and Indian traditions, by examining one of the most important and often quoted texts in Indian religious and philosophical traditions: the theistic Bhavagad Gītā. From a more specific standpoint, the paper has a threefold goal: to offer a panentheistic reconstruction of the Gītā’s concept of God, to show how this panentheistic model of God entails a form of theistic cosmopsychism, and to locate the Gītā’s cosmopsychism within a broader map of cosmopsychist views. Based on this reconstructive analysis of the Gītā’s cosmopsychism, I also outline some few reflections on the philosophical prospects of theistic cosmopsychism. (shrink)

In this chapter, Ricardo Silvestre and Alan Herbert offer a reconstruction of the Gītā’s concept of God with a focus on the relationship between God and the world. They try to explain the claim that the Gītā is panentheistic. This is done with the help of some key notions of contemporary metaphysics (such as ontological dependence and fundamentality) along with the Indic notion of prakṛti, considered as a metaphysical primitive denoting the intimate relationship that exists between matter and conscious living (...) beings on the one hand, and God on the other. (shrink)

Although there is such a thing as Indian thought, it seems to play no role in the way social sciences and philosophy are practiced in India or elsewhere. The problem is not only that we no longer employ terms such as atman, avidya, dharma to reflect on our experience; the terms that we do indeed use—sovereignty, secularism, rights, civil society and political society, corruption—seem to insulate our experience from our reflection. This paper will outline Gandhi’s framing of our predicament in (...) Hind Swaraj. It will then discuss three very different examples taken from our peculiar life with concepts that will also serve to clarify and illustrate the framework I am outlining. It will then very briefly discuss how Gandhi saw the Gita as showing him a way out of the predicament. (shrink)

In this paper, I delve into the methodologies employed by scholars such as Otto Schrader, Krishna Belvalkar, Franklin Edgerton, and Vishwa Adluri to substantiate the potential existence of a Kashmiri recension of the Bhagavad Gita through the application of the lectio principle. The lectio difficilior, or "harder reading," posits that a more complex and challenging reading in a text is likely to be the older and superior one, as scribes tend to simplify intricate passages into more straightforward forms, known (...) as the lectio facilior, in later versions of a text. The lectio principle prominently shapes the discourse of these scholars regarding the plausibility of a Kashmiri recension of the Bhagavad Gita. (shrink)

This open access book presents a comparative study of two classics of world literature, offering the first sustained study of what unites and divides the Nicomachean Ethics and the Bhagavad Gita. -/- Asking what the texts think is the nature of moral action and how it relates to the highest good, Roopen Majithia shows how the Gita stresses the objectivity of knowledge and freedom from being a subject, while the Ethics emphasizes the knower, working out Aristotle’s central commitment (...) to the idea of substance as the primary building block of the world. Yet both the Gita and the Ethics explain variety in human behaviour in terms of three driving forces. Both agree moral agency is a construct that is a function of background, education and habit, presupposing a cultural, political and economic infrastructure. -/- What distinguishes the texts is how the content of right action is generated. Reading them together, alert to their individual accounts of how the practical relates to the reflective dimensions of life, Majithaia enriches our understanding of two cornerstone texts in the Greek and Indian philosophical traditions. -/- The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollectionsdotcom. Open access was funded by The Marjorie Young Bell Faculty Fund and The Hart Almerrin Massey Endowment. (shrink)

The philosophy of ‘karma’ is a doctrine to consider being the foundation stone of the entire Indian Philosophical outlook. The Bhagavad Gita is most beloved scripture of Indian thought and one of the prime chapters of this scripture is the ‘law of karma’. According to it, every man profit from what he does and suffers from what he does. Karmayoga is mainly based on niskam-karma but not the mere renunciation of Karma. We have to give up the attachment and (...) the fruit regarding the action. So, the action is our Svadharma, fruit or result is not our concern. The Gita said that the nature of Karma was natural, inherent in man’s existence and everybody has to work. Hence an attempt is made here to discuss the law of karma as considered by the Bhagavad Gita. (shrink)

Interpretations of the ethical significance of the Bhagavadgītā typically understand the debate between Arjuna and Kṛṣṇa in terms of a struggle between consequentialist and deontological doctrines. In this paper, I provide instead a reading of the Gītā which draws on a conception of moral thinking that can be understood to cut across those positions – that developed by Stanley Cavell, which he calls ‘Emersonian Moral Perfectionism’. In so doing, I emphasise how Kṛṣṇa’s consolation of Arjuna can centrally and fruitfully be (...) viewed as concerned with resuscitating the latter’s individuality, thereby allowing Arjuna to overcome an unthinking conformity to the current degenerate state of his society. This leads me to explore the relation between this perfectionist understanding of spiritual reorientation and the Gītā’s religious account of human redemption; and to conclude by suggesting how the text of the Gītā itself might have similar therapeutic designs upon its readers. (shrink)

The customary way of interpreting the dialogue between Arjuna and Kṛṣṇa in the Bhagavad-Gita is to consider it merely as an expression of the fear of the diffident Arjuna, who is depicted by almost all the commentators as being scared of fighting the battle, and Kṛṣṇa’s ingenuous solution to it. This paper argues that this common way of looking at the conflict leaves the central theme of the debate unattained and unsolved. The debate can also be viewed as a (...) statement of the confrontation between two ethics and two notions of the self. The claim is not that the customary interpretation is false, or that the present one is the only possible interpretation. It rather makes a much moderate claim that it is possible to give the text an alternative reading, which sheds some light on the nature of Indian ethics as such. It is long debated as to whether India had ever had an ethics. This paper claims to give some insight into the debate. (shrink)

A famous Indian argument for jus ad bellum and jus in bello is presented in literary form in the Mahābhārata: it involves events and dynamics between moral conventionalists (who attempt to abide by ethical theories that give priority to the good) and moral parasites (who attempt to use moral convention as a weapon without any desire to conform to these expectations themselves). In this paper I follow the dialectic of this victimization of the conventionally moral by moral parasites to its (...) philosophical culmination in the fateful battle, which the Bhagavad Gītā precedes. Arjuna’s lament is an internalization of the logic of conventional moral expectations that allowed moral parasitism, and Krishna’s push for a purely procedural approach to moral reasoning (bhakti yoga) does away with the good as a primitive of explanation and provides the moral considerations that allow us to see that the jus ad bellum and jus in bello coincide: the just cause is the approximation to the procedural ideal (the Lord), which is also just conduct. Jeff McMahan is correct in claiming that it is wrong for the unjust to attack the just. But it is also not obviously correct that it is the same set of moral considerations in war and peace that mark out the sides, for peace is largely characterizable by conventional morality, which all are forced to abandon in war. Walzer is correct that there are different sets of standards at play at war and peace, and that getting hands dirty in immorality is a price worth paying in war, but Walzer is thereby incorrect for a subtle reason: conventional standards by way of which jus ad bellum and jus in bello appear corrupt are themselves actually corrupt when the need for a just war arises. It is because moral parasites use conventional morality as a means of hostility and not as a means of fair, inclusive social interaction that conventional morality is corrupted and turned into a tool of the unjust. It is hence unjust to employ these standards to judge those whose cause is just, though such a judgement is conventional. Those who fight for a just cause thereby justly get their hands dirty by departing from conventional moral standards. But this is to the disadvantage of parasites who can only function in a climate where the conventionally good are constrained by conventional morality. Just war so understood deprives parasites their weapon of choice. (shrink)

While acknowledging a certain affinity between his own thought and the Vedanta concept of a world-soul or universal spirit, Josiah Royce nevertheless locates this concept primarily in what he terms the Second Conception of Being—Mysticism. In his early magnum opus, The World and the Individual, Royce utilizes aspects of the Upanishads in order to flesh out his picture of the mystical understanding of and relationship to being. My primary concern in the present investigation is to introduce some nuance into Royce’s (...) conception of Indian thought, which may then serve to suggest similar possibilities for nuance for Royce’s conception of the Absolute. I will attempt to do in two primary ways: first, I will consider Royce’s use of Indian thought via the Upanishads in explicating his second historical conception of Being. I will then turn briefly to Emerson’s poem ‘Brahma’ and the Bhagavad Gita to see if a certain reversal that occurs in both places problematizes Royce’s depiction of the universal spirit in Indian thought as well as opens up new possibilities for Royce’s own Absolute. (shrink)

‘Sapiens and Sthitaprajna’ studies the concept of a wise person in the Stoic Seneca and in the Bhagavad-Gita. Although the Gita and Seneca’s writings were composed at least two centuries and a continent apart, they have much in common in recommending a well lived life. This book describes how in both - a wise person is endowed with both virtue and wisdom, is moral, makes right judgments and takes responsibility for actions. A wise and virtuous person always enjoys (...) happiness, as happiness consists in knowing that one has done the right thing at the right time. Both Seneca and the Gita demand intellectual rigor and wisdom for leading a virtuous and effective life. They provide guidelines for how to become and be wise. Both systems demand a sage to be emotionally sound and devoid of passions. This leads to mental peace and balance, and ultimately tranquility and happiness. While surveying these similarities, this study also finds differences in their ways of application of these ideas. The metaphysics of the Gita obliges the sage to practice meditation, while the Stoics require a sage to be a rational person committed to analyzing and intellectualizing any situation. This comparative study will be of interest to students of both Ancient Western and Ancient Indian Philosophy. Practitioners of Stoicism and followers of the Gita should find the presence of closely related ideas in a very different tradition of interest while perhaps finding somewhat different prescriptions a spur to action. (shrink)

We normally function through the mind without knowing the mechanics of understanding. This book teaches us how to make thoughts and how to control once mind, so that we can live peaceful life and achieve the highest goal of life, i.e. self-realization. Book also deals with the fundamentals of life and spirituality. Book has written in a simple language so that most of the peoples will understand the real essence of the life. The author has discussed about the complex messages (...) of the Vedanta, in a thoughtful manner. The author discusses about Jiva, Jagat, Ishvara and Spiritual life in his book by referencing verses from the Bhagwat Gita, Vedanta and Shrimad Bhagwat Mahapuran in very simple language. The purpose of writing this book is to understand our intrinsic nature. Book is so enriched with the wisdom that everyone should read it at least once. (shrink)

Religion-based AI chatbots serve religious practitioners by bringing them godly wisdom through technology. These bots reply to spiritual and worldly questions by drawing insights or citing verses from the Quran, the Bible, the Bhagavad Gita, the Torah, or other holy books. They answer religious and theological queries by claiming to offer historical contexts and providing guidance and counseling to their users. A criticism of these bots is that they may give inaccurate answers and proliferate bias by propagating homogenized versions (...) of the religions they represent. These “embodied spiritual machines” may likewise bear bias against women, their gender, and their societal roles. This paper crafts a concept intended to address this GPT issue by reimagining, modifying, and implementing a feminist approach to these chatbots. It examines the concepts and designs of these bots and how they address women-related questions. Along with the challenge of bringing gender and diversity-sensitive religious wisdom closer to the people through technology, the paper proposes a re-engineered model of a fair religion-based AI chatbot. (shrink)

Theocentrism is the position that places God at the centre of discourse; God is the Landlord and Manager of everything that exists. Analogous to other environmental theories such as anthropocentrism, zoocentrism, biocentrism, ecocentrism and eco-feminism, theocentrism posits that God owns the universe and so the best manual on how to come to term with the universe emanates from Him. God's commands are contained both in written scriptures and in oral traditions. While the former includes the Bible, Qur’an, Bhagavad Gita, (...) amongst others, the latter includes proverbs, myths, taboos, totems and rituals observed by different cultures across the globe. Unfortunately, a prevailing misinterpretation of scriptures considers theocentrism as nothing but ontological anthropocentrism, of which anthropocentric position in all its strands is the egoistic. It is the moribund environmentalist position humanity has ever devised. The argument of this paper is that the authentic theocentric position is anti-anthropocentric. This position is embedded implicitly or explicitly in the Scriptures if it can be carefully unraveled. Actually It continues thenceforth to establish that theocentric position is distinctly different from every other position. It is yet the most environmentally friendly position, without necessarily being at the expense of humans. (shrink)

In this paper, a new Intervention Meditation approach is outlined by the current author. To overcome lack of clarity in defining meditation, a new universal Operational definition of meditation is proposed with elaborative explanation. The new meditation approach has multitude of deeper concepts from Bhagavad Gita and modern psychology and the expert / Guru of the proposed method must be a qualified and experienced before getting trained on this approach specifically. This paper elevates meditation from a casual approach level (...) to a separate systematic branch of psychology level. (shrink)

This paper aims at an analytical explanation of the distinctive nature of music, as it has been formulated in perhaps one of the world's very first works on the subject, namely the ‘Sangeet Ratnakar’ of Pandit Sarangadeva, a 13th century musicologist of India. He, in the first chapter of the work defines music ('sangeet' in Sanskrit and Hindi) as a composite of singing or 'Gita', instrumental music or 'vadan' and dancing or ‘nrittam’. In addition, he also holds singing to (...) be the most important component of music. These two ideas are not only unquestionably acceptable , as the analysis in the paper will show, but give to Indian music , in its difference from western music, its distinctively spiritual character, making it a path to liberation or Moksha (Muktidayakam na tu ranjakam). Sarangadeva's reason, here, is not rational but empirico-inductive. It is that mainly by virtue of its 'gitam’ (singing component), which, like the Yoga system of exercise, needing only one's body as its instrument, music too needing only one’s voice is as self-sufficient and autonomous as the ultimate Reality itself (Swayamev Rajate). In the hierarchy (a distinctively ancient Indian insistence) of arts, singing is the highest and unique because in spite of being heard by the auditory sense, it affects our 'reflective sensibility' and transports us to the virtual world of melodic and rhythmic forms. Forms, as against their particular illustrations, are abstract universals. Ultimate Reality is also a Form-all comprehensive and internally harmonious. However, pure Form, whether melodic or religious or even rational like that of triangularity, is almost impossible to concentrate on. Realizing this practical difficulty, Indian scriptures and the world's first Grammarian-linguist, Acharya Panini, framed a composite sound as the manifestation of the ultimate musical Form. This purely formal-because devoid of all meaning, sound is that of 'om', spelt, in Sanskrit as a conjunction (sandhi) of 'a'+'u'+'m'. For Indian musicologists and musicians, ‘om’ is the perfect manifestation of the Sound-God or ‘Nada-Brahman’ because, 1. Its composite nature resembles God, as a harmony of 'sat', 'chit', and 'ananda'; and 2. The composite sound is self-existent as its all three components-two vowels, i.e. ‘a’, ‘u’, and one consonant i.e. ‘m’, can be and are pronounced just as they originally are, -un-elongated and un-vitiated and therefore pure. This is the reason why every recital of Indian classical vocal music is begun with an elaborate rendering of 'om' as an invocation to Sound-God or ‘Nada-Brahman’. Scholarly and authentic, this ancient Indian approach to music, is undoubtedly the earliest and original. My observation is that its main contentions like Sharang Dev’s insistence that of the three components of music, ‘gitam’ or singing is the highest, have only been translated and never argued for. In this presentation my good intention is to provide much needed rational support for making these key statements in this unparalleled Indian text, indubitable and unquestionable. (shrink)

Bimal Krishna Matilal (1935-1991) was a Harvard-educated Indian philosopher best known for his contributions to logic, but who also wrote on wide variety of topics, including metaethics. Unfortunately, the latter contributions have been overlooked. Engaging with Anglo-American figures such as Gilbert Harman and Bernard Williams, Matilal defends a view he dubs ‘pluralism.’ In defending this view he draws on a wide range of classical Indian sources: the Bhagavad-Gītā, Buddhist thinkers like Nāgārjuna, and classical Jaina concepts. This pluralist position is somewhere (...) between relativism and absolutist realism. Unlike the relativist, he argues that there is a genuinely universal morality; unlike the absolutist, he argues that there are multiple, but often conflicting and incommensurable, moral frameworks and ideals. This paper will explain his objections to relativism, as well as flesh out his suggestive remarks about his own pluralistic account. (shrink)

The paper presents a method for interpreting religious texts for use in psychotherapy. In particular, the paper takes the example of the pivotal character Arjuna in Bhagavad-Gita as having low frustration tolerance and uses the collective philosophy of the Bhagavad-Gita and Bhagavata-Purana through six steps of Logic-Based Therapy to overcome it. Although the paper uses Hindu religious texts, the treatment of these texts will speak to anyone interested in the possibility of integrating religious texts into psychotherapy.

This book analyses the concepts of God in Vaisnavism, which is commonly referred to as one of the great Hindu monotheistic traditions. Addressing the question of what attributes God possesses according to particular textual sources and traditions in Vaisnavism, the book analyses Vaisnava traditions and texts in order to locate them within a global philosophical framework. The book is divided into two sections. The first one, God in Vaisnava Texts, deals with concepts of God found in the canonical Vaisnava texts: (...) the Bhavagad Gita, the Bhagavata Purana, the Pancaratras, and the Mahabharata. The second section, God in Vaisnava Traditions, addresses concepts of God found in several Vaisnava traditions and their respective key theologians. As well as the Alvars, five traditional Vaisnava schools- the Sri Vaisnava tradition, the Madhva tradition, the Nimbarka tradition, the Pustimarga tradition, and the Caitanya Vaisnava tradition- and two contemporary ones Ramakrishna's and Swami Bhaktivedanta's are considered. The book combines normative, critical and descriptive elements. Some chapters are philosophical in nature, others are more descriptive, unpacking a specific Vaiṣṇava concept of God for future philosophical analysis and critique. Written by experts who break new ground in presenting and representing a diversity of Vaiṣṇava texts and tradition, the book presents approaches that reflect the amount of philosophical and historical deliberation on the specific issues and divine attributes considered. This book will be of interest to researchers in the fields of philosophy of religion and Indian philosophy, cross-cultural and comparative philosophy, analytic philosophy of religion, Hindu studies, theology and religious studies. (shrink)

The theme of essential futility, absurdity, utter incomprehensibility of life and death is stressed in almost allthe writings of Albert Camus. Like Buddha he was shocked by the sight of human misery and mortality. Yet, paradoxically was attracted to the essential desirability of it. Although completely ruffled by the consciousness of an ambiguous and silent God, he was not unaware of “that strange joy that comes from a tranquil conscience”, a perfect inner harmony one experiences on attaining true knowledge. Upanishads (...) are a search for this very reality underlying the flux of things. Malraux, Sartre, and others had already developed this line of thought before Camus. What is essential and original in him is, firstly, that the world’s absurdity not a cause for despair, but on the contrary, a spur to happiness. And secondly, that , mortality and suffering actually enhance the value of life: they invite men to live more intensely. In addition to absurdity another subject the Upanishads insistently deal with is ethics, the purity of human conduct. Very much in the manner of the Existentialists, the Upanishads, aeons before, hold man himself responsible for his actions. Dr. Radhakrishnan, very aptly says that Existentialism is a new name for an ancient method. In Albert Camus and India Sharad Chandra has put forward a convincing comparative study of the two philosophies as expounded in their respective literatures. Her argument is that the parallel ideas found in the two views are not mere fortuitous conclusions but, either the result of seminal influence, or emanation of a common, deeper vision. Reading of the book will help the reader to form a firm opinion. Camus had read the Gita and had attended the lectures given by Swami Shraddhananda of the Ramakrishna Mission in Paris. (shrink)

Review of 'Peace or Perish' by J P Vaswani published by Gita Publishing House.

दार्शनिक निबन्ध (Philosophical Essays) Dr. Desh Raj Sirswal No. CPPIS/2020/01 First Edition: March 2020 .

Religious violence is a function of deep philosophical and psychological belief-behavior. This article explores the issue in light of Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, and Psychology of evil.